Get PolitiFact in your inbox.

Joshua Gillin
By Joshua Gillin August 3, 2017

Hillary Clinton not dead from heart attack, as fake news site claims

An online story about former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton suffering not just one heart attack, but three, is a fake news story concocted by a parody site run by a liberal troll.

"Breaking: Hillary Clinton has third heart attack — docs says she ‘won’t survive’," read the headline on a July 28, 2017, post on PoliticsPaper.com. Facebook users flagged the post as being potentially fabricated, as part of the social media site’s efforts to combat fake news.

The article called Clinton the "Butcher of Benghazi" and quoted Dr. Eugene Icsa of Westchester Memorial Hospital in upstate New York as saying, "We predict she’ll be at rest within hours."

The story further said daughter Chelsea was visiting, but husband and former President Bill Clinton was "sitting on the front porch of the Chappaqua mansion drinking what looks like either tomato juice or a Bloody Mary."

There have been no other reports of Hillary Clinton suffering a massive coronary episode; it’s because she hasn’t. The story is fake.

The photo ostensibly of a doctor feverishly working to save Clinton’s life is actually a stock photo we most recently found on a Seattle Times story about the challenges facing trauma nurses.

Featured Fact-check

There’s not even a Westchester Memorial Hospital in upstate New York, as far as we can tell. There is a Westchester Medical Center in Westchester, N.Y., but that’s it.

This item was originally posted on July 22 on TheLastLineOfDefense.org, a website run by a man named Christopher Blair, who creates absurd news stories in an attempt to fool conservative readers.

A footnote on the bottom of the website said that "everything on this site is a satirical work of fiction." The warning is repeated in the About Us section, where a disclaimer reads, "We present fiction as fact and our sources don’t actually exist."

This site and its troll-run brethren like to write about Clinton’s death quite a bit. OurLandOfTheFree.com, a related website, wrote on July 13 that Clinton died of an overdose of Dilaudid, which is a brand-name of the opioid painkiller hydromorphone. TheLastLineOfDefense.org also ran a series of stories in which Hillary and Chelsea Clinton died in a boating accident that was the result of sabotage.

Clinton is still very much in the news, since Republican members of Congress continue to push for investigations into her own campaign activities. But she’s still alive.

We rate this claim Pants On Fire!

Share the Facts
1
1
7
PolitiFact rating logo PolitiFact Rating:
Pants on Fire
"Hillary Clinton has third heart attack — docs says she ‘won’t survive’."
in Internet posts
Friday, July 28, 2017

Browse the Truth-O-Meter

More by Joshua Gillin

Hillary Clinton not dead from heart attack, as fake news site claims

Support independent fact-checking.
Become a member!

In a world of wild talk and fake news, help us stand up for the facts.

Sign me up